Gascón brings in L.A. cops on high-profile case

Homicide victim Hughues de la Plaza and with Melissa Nix in an undated photo.

Homicide victim Hughues de la Plaza and with Melissa Nix in an undated photo.

Photo: Melissa Nix

Photo: Melissa Nix

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Homicide victim Hughues de la Plaza and with Melissa Nix in an undated photo.

Homicide victim Hughues de la Plaza and with Melissa Nix in an undated photo.

Photo: Melissa Nix

Gascón brings in L.A. cops on high-profile case

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San Francisco's new police chief is bringing in Los Angeles police homicide detectives to review a 2007 death that has locked the city in an embarrassing tug-of-war with authorities in France.

Hugues de la Plaza, a 36-year-old French national, was discovered stabbed to death in his locked Hayes Valley apartment June 2, 2007, after neighbors found blood outside the unit.

The San Francisco police investigation was inconclusive on the question of whether de la Plaza had been slain or had killed himself. The city's medical examiner - who makes the official determination - was unable to decide.

Police investigators said initially that the case was being looked at as a possible suicide and, to this day, de la Plaza's death is not included in the Police Department's homicide tally for 2007.

De la Plaza's family and friends rejected any suggestion of suicide, emphasizing that no bloody knife had been found in his Linden Street apartment. They also said de la Plaza, a sound engineer, had never shown any suicidal tendencies, and in fact had been making plans to move to Argentina.

Police said he may have washed the knife or tossed it out the window before dying, but they could never fully account for its absence.

De la Plaza's acquaintances began what became an international campaign and persuaded the French government to probe the death of de la Plaza, who held dual French and U.S. citizenship. The French investigators said earlier this year that de la Plaza appeared to have been killed in a surprise attack outside his apartment and could not have committed suicide.

On Thursday, new Police Chief George Gascón met with representatives of the French government, and said afterward that Los Angeles Police Chief William Bratton had agreed to have two of his homicide investigators look at the case.

He said they are not conducting a separate investigation from scratch, simply reviewing the findings to date. Their salaries will be paid by Los Angeles, but San Francisco will pick up their expenses, Gascón said.

"It's important for a third party, who is unbiased and has no ax to grind," to do the review, said Gascón, an assistant police chief in Los Angeles before becoming chief in Mesa, Ariz., in 2006.

"This has been a very emotional case," Gascón said. "There's no question that people have expressed concerns how the San Francisco Police Department handled this. It's important to clear the air."

Gascón said he has also invited French authorities to work in "full partnership" with San Francisco and Los Angeles investigators. He promised to make the Los Angeles findings public.

"If there are areas we can improve upon, we will do so," the chief said. "The goal is to provide closure for the family and find the perpetrator."

Earlier this year, de la Plaza's father, Francois de la Plaza, said French forensic experts had concluded that the stabbing must have happened outside the apartment.

The investigators, whose report has not been made public, determined that de la Plaza could not have stabbed himself based on "the way the knife entered," his father said.

"No knife was ever found," he said. "For (the French investigators) it was rather obvious."

Lt. Mike Stasko, head of the San Francisco police homicide unit, said he welcomed the Los Angeles police involvement.

"We have nothing to hide," Stasko said. "I want them to come with a fresh set of eyes. If there is something that we've missed, that could be a new lead."

Melissa Nix, a former girlfriend of de la Plaza who has led the fight to have the case classified as a homicide, said she was "very glad to hear that (Gascón) is looking outside the ranks of the homicide unit to get to the bottom of this fiasco."

"It doesn't take a rocket scientist to see that this is a horrific case of incompetence," Nix said. "I really hope he does the right thing."